Maybe absurd, but I blame the current administration in the USA for this. Remember "I looked into his eyes and saw his soul" Stupid dumb&$$ got taken by the consummate KGB professional, and should have seen it coming. Putin is highly intelligent, I cannot say the same for the stupid dumb&$$.
The Russians are going around and dredging up practically everything that the USA administration used for the invasion of Iraq.
Now it comes out that the Georgians were warned by the State Department not to engage the operation they did, and they blew it off and fouled up big time. They bit the bear, and the bear is striking back. Georgia and Saakaashvili can kiss NATO and EU membership bye bye. If they had not acted rashly and launched the stupid operation into S. Ossetiya, and lobbied instead for international awareness, perhaps they had a shot at NATO and the EU in the future. All the dumb&$$ can do is sick Condi Rice and her vitriolic tongue on the Russians, and I am sure they are lying about in the Kremlin snickering.
This week was very telling in the candidates response to the invents there, one guy was on vacation in Hawaii and issued a flaccid statement through his press secretary, while the ex Navy guy was saying Reaganesque things like "We are all Georgians now" and talking tough.
Adversity and the former KGB officer do not respect dumb&$$es with flaccid comments, they only respect and pay attention to sabre rattling.
Russia will stall, crawl, dither etc. They have all the cards and nothing to lose. Who is going to do something? The Europeans cannot, they have too much Russian natural gas flowing across in pipelines that they are addicted to, and the Americans cannot, because their President is hiding out with Karen Hughes in Crawford.